CCI's 2025 Ontario Pre-Budget Recommendations

By Skaidra Puodžiūnas
CCI Director of Ontario Affairs‍

Ontario is at a critical inflection point. As we move toward Budget 2025, the Council of Canadian Innovators (CCI) believes there is an opportunity for the province to rethink its role in a rapidly changing global economy. Representing over 150 of Canada’s most dynamic technology companies—including 75 headquartered right here in Ontario—CCI sees a path forward that leverages the strengths of our tech sector to tackle systemic challenges and seize the opportunities of the digital age.

Ontario’s economic engine has traditionally run on a powerful blend of talent, research, and entrepreneurship. Yet today, our province faces pressures that are testing the resilience of our economy—from labour shortages to supply chain disruptions, and from persistent inflation to the shadow of a potential recession. These issues cannot be addressed with incremental tweaks. Instead, they demand a strategic reorientation towards innovation, where homegrown tech and digital transformation become core pillars of Ontario’s policy agenda. It’s a shift that requires vision, but also the practical, everyday commitment to build systems that scale.

The future of Ontario’s prosperity is increasingly tied to the value of intangible assets—intellectual property, data, and digital infrastructures that underpin the modern economy. Yet, our current frameworks still lean heavily on traditional metrics of success, like foreign direct investment, rather than building and scaling homegrown capabilities. This misalignment is not just a missed opportunity; it’s a strategic vulnerability in a world where agility and adaptability define economic leadership. To address this, CCI proposes a set of targeted, actionable recommendations for Budget 2025 that align with the province's goals and capacity for transformation:
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Access to Customers: Procurement Modernization and Local Companies

1. Help domestic companies sell to government by creating and deploying a procurement concierge service through Supply Ontario. This would ensure that innovative solutions are not just welcomed, but actively sought, within public service delivery.
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2. Prioritize Ontario-based firms through initiatives like the Building Ontario Business Initiative, turning the power of public procurement into a driver for local economic growth.
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3. Strengthen Ontario’s healthcare system by continuing work on the innovation pathway, ensuring that domestic tech companies can play a leading role in making the sector more responsive and integrated.
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Access to Capital: Growth Capital

4. Establish a co-investment strategy through Venture Ontario to direct growth capital into high-priority sectors, fostering a more resilient innovation ecosystem.
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5. Develop measurable performance indicators to assess both domestic innovation expenditures and foreign direct investment (FDI), ensuring Ontario’s investments yield tangible outcomes.
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Access to Talent

6. Address Ontario’s skilled labour shortage by improving access to talent pipelines, particularly for scaling tech companies. This is key to keeping pace with the demands of a knowledge-driven economy.
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Whole-of-Government Approaches to the Digital Economy

7. Protect and support domestic firms as Ontario implements its cyber, data, and privacy legislation, with a specific focus on Bill 194, the Strengthening Cyber Security and Building Trust in the Public Sector Act. Policy should not just regulate but catalyze digital leadership.
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8. Expand access to high-value data sets by advancing the establishment of Ontario’s Data Authority, creating a new public infrastructure that underpins economic and social innovation.
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These recommendations come from CEOs and senior leaders who have successfully navigated the complexities of both local and global markets. They understand the importance of aligning policy with potential, and they know what’s required to make Ontario a leader in the global innovation economy. By embracing these proposals, Ontario has the chance to not only address its immediate challenges but to build a future-ready economy that is more inclusive, resilient, and competitive.

To read CCI’s full 2025 Ontario Pre-Budget Submission, click here.

Skaidra Puodziunas leads CCI's Ontario Bureau and works on behalf of innovators in Ontario to advance strategies at Queen's Park that help domestic companies scale-up globally. To learn more about CCI's Ontario advocacy efforts, email Skaidra at spuodziunas@canadianinnovators.org.

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About the Council of Canadian Innovators

The Council of Canadian Innovators is a national member-based organization reshaping how governments across Canada think about innovation policy, and supporting homegrown scale-ups to drive prosperity. Established in 2015, CCI represents and works with over 150 of Canada’s fastest-growing technology companies. Our members are the CEOs, founders, and top senior executives behind some of Canada’s most successful ‘scale-up’ companies. All our members are job and wealth creators, investors, philanthropists, and experts in their fields of health tech, cleantech, fintech, cybersecurity, AI and digital transformation. Companies in our portfolio are market leaders in their verticals, commercialize their technologies in over 190 countries, and generate between $10M-$750M in annual recurring revenue. We advocate on their behalf for government strategies that increase their access to skilled talent, strategic capital, and new customers, as well as expanded freedom to operate for their global pursuits of scale.